OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, (PIC)
When the Israeli occupation forces storm al-Aqsa Mosque, close its gates, or prevent its staff from performing their work, the same question is repeated: how are the affairs of al-Aqsa Mosque managed? This question is not purely administrative, but rather political and sovereign par excellence, because managing al-Aqsa means who owns the decision in prayer, maintenance, guarding, and entry to the place, and who tries to snatch this decision by force and impose new realities.
How are the affairs of al-Aqsa Mosque originally managed?
From a legal and historical standpoint, the blessed al-Aqsa Mosque belongs to the administration of the Islamic Waqf Department in Jerusalem, which is affiliated with the Jordanian Ministry of Awqaf. This is not a matter of protocol, but rather an expression of the Hashemite guardianship over the Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, and of a historical status that was settled before and after the Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem.
This administration covers the entire area of al-Aqsa Mosque, which amounts to 144 dunums, including the roofed prayer halls, yards, gates, minarets, stone benches, the Dome of the Rock, the Qibli Mosque, Bab al-Rahma, and all other landmarks inside the Haram.
Practically, the Waqf takes charge of supervising worship affairs, organizing the work of guards, custodians, and employees, following up on maintenance and restoration, and managing Sharia schools and some religious and educational activities inside the Mosque. It is the party that determines, originally, what relates to opening and closing the gates within the requirements of religious and administrative work, and follows up on matters of cleaning, electricity, water, libraries, and manuscripts, as well as coordinating the attendance of worshipers on religious occasions and seasons.
However, this picture is not complete if presented as if it is a stable administration operating freely. The reality is that the Waqf manages al-Aqsa under daily pressure from the occupation, and in an open conflict zone over sovereignty, identity, and the religious function of the place.
A religious administration under an occupation that imposes its restrictions
After the occupation of East Jerusalem in 1967, the occupation authorities kept the internal religious administration of the Mosque in the hands of the Islamic Waqf, but they did not give up their security and military control over the city, the surroundings of al-Aqsa, and its external gates. Here the fundamental contradiction began: an Islamic religious administration on one hand, and an occupation force controlling the entrances, movement, and incursions, and imposing prevention and deportation on the other hand.
This means that the Waqf is responsible for the Mosque, but the occupation has the ability to disrupt its decisions, restrict its work, prevent its employees from arriving, arrest its guards, deport its director and employees, close a specific gate, or allow the settlers to enter at times imposed by force of arms.
Therefore, whoever asks how the affairs of al-Aqsa Mosque are managed must understand that the answer is complex: the official administration belongs to the Waqf, while the pressing field control belongs to the occupation, which constantly seeks to undermine this administration, not just monitor it.
In recent years, this interference has escalated to more dangerous levels. The occupation is no longer satisfied with security control around al-Aqsa, but has come to work on reducing the role of the Waqf itself, interfering in maintenance, objecting to restoration works, imposing new balances at Bab al-Rahma, pursuing guards, and providing organized protection for the incursions of settlers and Judaization groups.
What does the Waqf manage daily inside al-Aqsa?
The daily management of al-Aqsa Mosque is not a general title, but rather a branching work that begins with the details of worship and does not end with protecting the architectural and heritage structure of the place. There are the guards who follow up on the gates and yards, monitor violations, and organize internal movement according to the religious nature of the place.
There are also maintenance employees who deal with electricity and water networks, address malfunctions, and preserve sensitive historical buildings.
The management also includes following up on the affairs of the prayer halls, furnishing the Mosque, organizing the loudspeakers, preparing for the month of Ramadan and major seasons, coordinating with the science and preaching committees, and caring for libraries, manuscripts, and religious centers associated with the Mosque.
These works appear to be services, but in al-Aqsa they carry the meaning of administrative steadfastness and institutional permanence in the face of a replacement project that wants to empty the place of its Islamic reference.
The guards in particular perform a role that goes beyond a routine job. They are field witnesses to incursions and violations, and are often at the forefront of those subjected to assault, arrest, or deportation. For this reason, the occupation continuously targets them, because it realizes that their organized presence is one of the last lines proving that the Mosque has an existing Islamic administration and not just a symbolic one.
Who opens the gates and who decides entry?
In the normal state, the Waqf administration is the reference in the internal affairs of the Mosque, but the occupation has imposed a distorted equation at the gates. Some external gates are subject to the security of the occupation police, who control the entry of worshipers, prevent certain age groups, detain personal identification cards, close entrances in times of tension, or impose conditions on access to the Mosque on Fridays and the month of Ramadan.
This point is essential because control over the gate practically means influencing the function of the Mosque. If the Waqf manages the place from the inside, but the occupation decides who enters and who is prevented, it is trying to confiscate the essence of the administration, not just its form. Therefore, Palestinians see that the battle of al-Aqsa is not about narrow administrative arrangements, but about the right of Muslims to manage their Mosque and access it without permission from an occupation force.
The most dangerous thing is that the occupation uses this security control to establish settler incursions under the name of visits. It opens the way for settlers during specific periods, provides them with armed protection, prevents objections from worshipers and activists, and in many cases deports whoever confronts these incursions. In this sense, it does not only organize entry, but reshapes it to serve a counter political and religious project.
How are decisions regarding restoration and maintenance made?
In principle, restoration and maintenance are the specialization of the Islamic Waqf and its affiliated technical bodies. This includes repairing historical buildings, maintaining domes, roofs, and walls, treating humidity and cracks, and preserving the Islamic architectural identity of al-Aqsa. However, the occupation repeatedly interferes to obstruct these works or subject them to its conditions, especially when it comes to areas it considers sensitive.
This has appeared clearly in multiple stages, when the occupation tried to prevent or delay restoration works, or picture them as a change to the status quo, while it itself imposes extensive changes on the surroundings of al-Aqsa and on the entire Old City through excavations, tunnels, and Judaization projects. This contradiction is intentional: it wants to prevent the Islamic administration from performing its natural role, and then claims that its presence is necessary to manage the place.
Here, a distinction must be made between actual management and the executing capacity. The Waqf is the owner of the legitimate and legal specialization, but its capacity to execute is not absolute due to the occupation. This is one of the aspects of the daily conflict in Jerusalem: not only who owns the right, but who owns the power to disrupt this right.
The Waqf Council and its role in managing al-Aqsa Mosque
Alongside the executive body affiliated with the Waqf Department, there is a Council for Awqaf, Islamic Affairs, and Holy Sites in Jerusalem, which plays a supporting and supervisory role in major files related to al-Aqsa and the holy sites. This Council has gained double importance in recent years, especially with the expansion of Israeli targeting and attempts to impose new arrangements inside the Mosque and its surroundings.
The role of the Council does not cancel the role of the Waqf Department, but rather reinforces it politically and institutionally. It contributes to stabilizing the Islamic position on controversial issues, follows up on developments, and issues positions regarding incursions, closures, and assaults on guards and worshipers. But once again, the fundamental problem remains that the occupation deals with these references as an obstacle to its project, not a partner in organizing the place.
Why is the occupation trying to reduce this administration?
The answer is clear: because the remaining of the Waqf as a real reference inside al-Aqsa Mosque means the remaining of practical recognition of its Arabism and Islamism, and means that the occupation has not succeeded in imposing full sovereignty over the holiest of Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem. Therefore, it works to exhaust this administration step by step, through deportations, summonses, arrests, preventing restoration, controlling gates, expanding incursions, and proposing a temporal and spatial division, even if gradually and undeclared at some stages.
This policy does not target employees only, but also targets people’s awareness. When the occupation police are pictured as the decision-maker in al-Aqsa, and when guards and employees are treated as if they are just secondary workers, the reality of the place is being falsified. The truth is that the administration of al-Aqsa is Islamic, and that the occupation is a temporary force trying to impose facts by force of arms, not by right or legitimacy.
Between administration and sovereignty, where does the battle stand today?
It is impossible to separate the management of al-Aqsa Mosque from the issue of sovereignty over it. Formally, some might say that the Waqf still manages the affairs of the Mosque, and this is partially true. But on the field level, the occupation disputes this administration with it every day, and tries to reduce it and turn it into a limited role within a space whose security joints it controls.
This is the core of the conflict
Therefore, defending al-Aqsa is not limited to preventing an incursion or rejecting a closure, but also includes protecting the reference that manages the Mosque and preserves its identity and religious function. Every assault on guards, prevention of restoration, deportation of employees, or imposition of entry restrictions is a direct assault on the management of the Mosque itself.
In the Palestinian consciousness, the management of al-Aqsa is not measured by stamps and regulations only, but by steadfastness in the face of the uprooting project. As long as the occupation seeks to dismantle the Islamic reference inside the Mosque, establishing this reference remains part of the battle of all Jerusalem.
The practical conclusion that should remain present: al-Aqsa is managed by the Islamic Waqf, the owner of the right, but it is besieged daily by an occupation that seeks to snatch this right, and therefore, protecting the administration here is not an administrative matter, but a duty to defend the place, identity, and narrative.